Wagering games based on the outcome of randomly generated or selected symbols are well known. Such games are widely played in gambling casinos and include card games wherein the symbols include the familiar, common playing cards. Card games such as Black Jack, Pai Gow poker, Caribbean Stud.TM. poker and others are excellent card games for use in casinos. Desirable attributes of casino card games are that they are exciting, that they can be learned and understood easily by players, and that they move or can be played rapidly to their wager-resolving outcome.
One of the above-mentioned games, pai gow poker, has all the desired attributes of casino games and is increasing rapidly in popularity. Broadly, the game involves up to seven players, each player receiving a seven card hand, one hand being dealt completely before the next. The first player to receive a hand is randomly selected, bets are placed, and the hands are distributed, set and shown. The bets are resolved based on the well known hierarchy of poker hands and against the dealer's hand. Because of the number of cards in each hand, the number of players, and the rapidity of play, pai gow poker requires frequent card shuffling, diminishing the excitement of the game and reducing the number of wagers placed in a given amount of time.
The fact that playing time is diminished by shuffling and dealing, particularly in games such as pai gow poker, but in other casino games as well, has lead to the development of electromechanical or mechanical card shuffling devices. Such devices increase the speed of shuffling and dealing, thereby increasing playing time, adding to the excitement of a game while reducing the time the dealer or house has to spend in preparing to play the game.
U.S. Pat. Nos. 4,513,969 (to Samsel, Jr.) and 4,515,367 (to Howard) disclose automatic card shufflers. The Samsel, Jr. patent discloses a card shuffler having a housing with two wells for receiving two reserve stacks of cards. A first extractor selects, removes and intermixes the bottommost card from each stack and delivers the intermixed cards to a storage compartment. A second extractor sequentially removes the bottommost card from the storage compartment and delivers it to a typical shoe from which the dealer may take it for presentation to the players. The Howard patent discloses a card mixer for randomly interleaving cards including a carriage supported ejector for ejecting a group of cards (approximately two playing decks in number) which may then be removed manually from the shuffler or dropped automatically into a chute for delivery to a typical dealing shoe. Neither of the Samsel, Jr. or Howard patents discloses a dealing module for dealing hands of a predetermined number of cards depending on the rules and procedures of the game being played, and neither discloses a display means for displaying game-related information to players.
U.S. Pat. No. 4,586,712 (to Lorber, et al.) discloses an automatic shuffling apparatus directed toward reducing the dead time generated when a casino dealer manually has to shuffle multiple decks of playing cards. The Lorber, et al. apparatus has a container, a storage device for storing shuffled playing cards, a removing device and an inserting device for intermixing the playing cards in the container, a dealing shoe and supplying means for supplying the shuffled playing cards from the storage device to the dealing shoe. The dealing shoe is typical, being designed to dispense or allow the dealer to extract and deal one card at a time. The Lorber, et al. apparatus is designed to intermix cards under the programmed control of a computer, but does not disclose or suggest how to provide a dealing module for automatically, sequentially dealing or forming hands having a predetermined number of cards or a display means for displaying game-related information to players.
Other known card shuffling devices are disclosed in U.S. Pat. Nos. 2,778,644 (to Stephenson), 4,497,488 (to Plevyak et al.) and 4,807,884 (issued to John G. Breeding, the inventor of the present invention, and commonly owned). The Breeding patent discloses a machine for automatically shuffling a deck of cards. The apparatus includes a deck receiving zone, a carriage section for separating a deck into two deck portions, a sloped mechanism positioned between adjacent corners of the deck portions, and an apparatus for snapping the cards over the sloped mechanism to interleave the cards. The Breeding patent is directed to providing a mechanized card shuffler whereby a deck may be shuffled often and yet the dealer still has adequate time to operate the game being played. Additionally, the Breeding shuffling device is directed to reducing the chance that cards become marked as they are shuffled and to keeping the cards in view constantly while they are being shuffled.
Although the devices disclosed in the preceding patents, particularly the Breeding card shuffling machine, provide significant improvements in card shuffling devices, such devices could be improved further if they could be equipped with a dealing module for receiving shuffled cards and for automatically dealing from the shuffled cards a number of hands one after the other, wherein each hand dealt by the module contains a predetermined, selected number of cards. Shuffling machines could also be improved if they could be adapted to facilitate playing a specific game selected from a group of different wagering games, and to display game-related information to the players.
Accordingly, there is a need for a shuffling machine for shuffling playing cards, wherein the machine is adapted for facilitating the playing of a selected card game by including a durable, efficient means for dealing hands of cards automatically, hand after hand, each hand containing a selected, predetermined number of the shuffled cards, and by including an automatic display means for displaying game information to players.